It's Always The Nice Ones
by Eliza4892
Summary: Claire has quite a different method of dealing with pain.


Of all the people on the island, a place inhabited by a fugitive, a drug-addict, a torturer, and probably many more that have done worse things than a normal person could fathom, Claire seems out of place. She's the least fucked up. Sure she was pregnant and unmarried when they crashed, which is considered a sin in some people's books. That's not what they all see though. She's known for a long time that people only see what they want to see. So in the eyes of the others she's the innocent mother. There's some kind of Virgin Mary comparisons that are dying to be drawn here and the whole thought kind of disgusts her because it's all so wrong. They don't know who she is. It's better that way.

Claire was the good girl. She was the pretty little blonde with eyes the color of the sea. On occasion she'd been told her features resembled that of a doll by other adoring mothers at some party or function she'd been invited to when she was a child. At five she smiled shyly and giggled. At twelve she forced a smile and got out of sight as quickly as possible. Even then there was this preconceived notion that she would be this fragile, soft-spoken girl with a gentle demeanor. Like a walking, talking doll. Beautiful but breakable. That wasn't her at all.

She had tried to fight it. Her blonde tresses were dyed a mousy brown, and she stopped doing homework. As a result her mother took her to a salon and ordered them to reverse the dye job, and she spent the next month confined to her room with just her books, allowed out only for school and to go to the bathroom. Next came the radio and the loud rock music. It wasn't really her thing but it pissed her mother off and that was the point. The radio was soon confiscated, as were the CDs. Over the next two years she made several other attempts at becoming something other than the good girl. They never worked.

At fourteen she gave up. She stopped trying to change everyone's opinions of her. The rebellion was over. Her mother never stopped riding her on everything and anything even though. She was always mad about something. Claire thought it had something to do with Claire's father running off before she was born. She didn't know much about her father other than he had a wife and son back in the states. Los Angeles. A part of her was angry with him for abandoning her before she was even born. It was why she never wanted to have kids. She didn't want to risk becoming her mother. Having to be a struggling single parent. The outlook didn't exactly seem rosy.

If she thinks back it all started when Bobby Hershwin cheated on her in eighth grade. Given her definition of cheating back then involved a simple kiss on the lips, but it had seemed like the end of the world to her. She had been sort of in love with him for a few years and when she caught him lip locked with the perky brunette she knew they were done and she was alone and the whole idea felt downright horrible to her. The remnants of her daddy abandonment issues. When she walked in the front door she had slammed it shut, pressing her back against it and sliding down until she was sitting on the floor, the word she had never once said in front of her mother slipping out. Fuck. It left her lips just as her mother entered the room which really was one more thing for her to yell about.

From there she had been sent to her room, but she made a small detour into the bathroom first. She was washing her hands with that jasmine scented soap she hated when she spotted the razor out of the corner of her eye. She was not naïve, and she had friends who did it, whether or not they would admit to it. With a shaking hand she gripped the razor and stood in front of the mirror, contemplating this new way to numb the pain.

If her mother ever noticed her sudden tendency for long sleeved shirts she never said anything about it. Either that or she just didn't care because at least Claire was occupied by something that wasn't getting her in trouble. There was no problem that couldn't be made to seem better, if only for a little while. It was unhealthy, but at the time it didn't matter. She traded one pain for another.

Her grades went up, she began to fake those smiles again, and she resigned herself to playing pretend in her life-size dollhouse. She lied the day away and channeled all her frustrations into that razor as it scratched her skin. With the blood went all the bad feelings. She slept better at night. And now she was the beautiful, well mannered young woman, which was possibly worse than the good girl. Still she humored them and did the right thing and pretended there was nothing wrong in her life whatsoever. They all bought the act. Claire wondered if maybe that was because they were all too busy keeping their lies straight, and their facades intact, to care about the flaws in hers. It was a good thing she learned how to play make-believe at a young age.

She met Rachel her last year of high school. Rachel was the eccentric girl who didn't conform to anyone's standards. She was sweet, yes, but firm when it counted. Like when she rolled up the sleeves on Claire's sweater one warm May and asked what the hell she thought she was doing. Rachel thought she had done the right thing by telling Claire's mother, but that only got her placed in therapy sessions they couldn't afford. After high school Claire moved out of her house and into an apartment with Rachel. She got a job at the fish fry. The cutting still continued whenever something went wrong. Then one morning she went to take a shower and found the razor had gone missing. Rachel told her to deal with it. Claire bought more. They too disappeared.

They say it takes twenty-one days to break a bad habit but it took Claire a little longer than that. The important thing was that it was broken. Within the year she had a new boyfriend. Thomas. She moved in with him after a few months, leaving Rachel behind. By January she was pregnant and by June he was gone. She was left with her mother's lot in life. Free from her friend's watchful eyes, there were times when she'd just stare at the razor and think about stopping it all. Just ending it. Not the pain but her life. She never did though, more so from lack of chances than anything else. Another three months of contemplating and lying and she was on a plane to Los Angeles, thanks to a psychic named Richard Malkin. And then came the island.

Here no one knows anything but what she wants them to know. Which isn't much. She can do no wrong; they'd all take her side in a heartbeat. She knows that would all change if they knew she wasn't as perfect as she appears to be. They would look at her differently. Treat her differently. The only exception is Jack whose eyes have found the scars that remain during one of her check-ups. There was no doubt in her mind that it would never come up. After all this was a man who decided the island's inhabitants didn't need to know they had a murderer among their ranks. He had kept Kate's secret. Hers paled in comparison. No one else knew, everyone else chose to not see the scratches. And then just like back on the mainland they created their own idea of her.

She may have had a blank slate here but they wrote all over it before she could even get to the chalk.


End file.
